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Last week, in Chicago, 16-year-old Darryl Green was found dead in the yard of an abandoned home. He was killed, relatives reported, because he refused to join a gang. Unlike most tragedies, however—which remain local news—this one caught the attention of conservative activist Ben Shapiro, an editor for Breitbart News. Using the hashtag “#justicefordarryl,” Shaprio tweeted and publicized the details of Green’s murder. But this wasn’t a call for help and assistance for Green’s family, rather, it was his response to wide outrage over Saturday’s decision in the case of George Zimmerman, where a Florida jury judged him “not guilty” of second-degree murder or manslaughter in the killing of Trayvon Martin.

Shapiro, echoing many other conservatives, is angry over the perceived politicization of the Zimmerman trial, and believes that activists have ”injected” race into the discussion, as if there’s nothing racial already within the criminal-justice system. Indeed, he echoes many conservatives when he complains that media attention had everything to do with Zimmerman’s race. If he were black, the argument goes, no one would care. And so, Shapiro found the sad story of Darryl Green, and promoted it as an example of the “black-on-black” crime that, he believes, goes ignored. Or, as he tweets, “49% of murder victims are black men. 93% of those are killed by other blacks. Media don’t care. Obama doesn’t care. #JusticeForDarryl.”

The idea that “black-on-black” crime is the real story in Martin’s killing isn’t a novel one. In addition to Shapiro, you’ll hear the argument from conservative African-American activists like Crystal White, as well as people outside the media, like Zimmerman defense attorney Mark O’Mara, who said that his client “never would have been charged with a crime” if he were black.

(It’s worth noting, here, that Zimmerman wasn’t charged with a crime. At least, not at first. It took six weeks of protest and pressure for Sanford police to revisit the killing and bring charges against him. Indeed, in the beginning, Martin’s cause had less to do with the identity of the shooter and everything to do with the appalling disinterest of the local police department.)

But there’s a huge problem with attempt to shift the conversation: There’s no such thing as “black-on-black” crime. Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime—86 percent were killed by white offenders. Indeed, for the large majority of crimes, you’ll find that victims and offenders share a racial identity, or have some prior relationship to each other.

What Shapiro and others miss about crime, in general, is that it’s driven by opportunism and proximity; If African-Americans are more likely to be robbed, or injured, or killed by other African-Americans, it’s because they tend to live in the same neighborhoods as each other. Residential statistics bear this out (PDF); blacks are still more likely to live near each other or other minority groups than they are to whites. And of course, the reverse holds as well—whites are much more likely to live near other whites than they are to minorities and African-Americans in particular.

Nor are African-Americans especially criminal. If they were, you would still see high rates of crime among blacks, even as the nation sees a historic decline in criminal offenses. Instead, crime rates among African-Americans, and black youth in particular, have taken a sharp drop. In Washington, D.C., for example, fewer than 10 percent of black youth are in a gang, have sold drugs, have carried a gun, or have stolen more than $100 in goods.

Thu Jul 25, 2013, 11:31 PM
morningfog
....
There’s no such thing as “black-on-black” crime. Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime—86 percent were killed by white offenders...

Now that would be a significant point supporting your thesis, moonbat, if the murder rates for both groups were the same. But they're not.

The ironic thing is that while this moonbat is doing their best to dispel the myth of black on black crime, they dispelled the myth of white on black crime in this one sentence:

Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime—86 percent were killed by white offenders.

So, 94% of black victims were killed by blacks meaning that only 6% were killed by non blacks, however, 86% of whites were killed by whites while 14% were killed by non-whites. Looks to me that it's open season on whites, not the other way around.

The American Left: Where everything is politics and politics is everything.

by Julie A. Phillips, Department of Sociology and Institute for Health, Heath Care Policy and Aging Research, Rutgers University

Race and ethnicity continue to be among the most important predictors of homicide commission and victimization in the United States, an issue that receives great attention from the media and, over the past few years, from social scientists. Recent figures indicate that young African-American males have eight times the homicide victimization and offending rates of their white counterparts, and incarceration rates for violent offenses for the black population are about five times those of the white population (U.S.Department of Justice 1999). Latinos also have an elevated risk of involvement in violent crime compared to non-Latino whites, although levels among this group don't approach the high rates experienced by black Americans. Despite the fact that rates of violent crime declined during the 1990s, mortality from homicide among minority groups is still extraordinarily high. Homicide remains the leading cause of death for black males between the ages of 15 and 24 and the second leading cause of death for Latino males in the same age group...

...The theory underlying the structural explanations for variation in homicide rates suggests that if white Americans were subjected to the same social pressures and structure disadvantages faced by minority populations, they would exhibit correspondingly high rates of homicide (Krivo and Peterson, 2000; Sampson and Wilson, 1995)...

So, it's quite clear that blacks are 8 times more likely to commit homicides and 8 times more likely to be the victim of homicides. The explanation given by academics for this is that whites are better off (have fewer "social pressures and structural disadvantages") than blacks and Latinos.

Phillips' study decides to test this idea, getting down to nitty gritty details. Feel free to read the entire study at the link above. What Phillips actually concludes, based on her results, is fascinating:

...However, with regard to several structural measures, Latinos appear to be the most disadvantaged. A lower percentage of Latinos have a college education, presumably due to the large number of Latin American (particularly Mexican) migrants who comprise this group. The influence of heavy and recent immigration among Latinos is also clear in stability measures. Both mobility...and the percentage of the population that is foreign-born are highest for the Latinos population, at 61.6% and 25.9% respectively...

...Several conclusions about the determinants of homicide levels across the three racial groups emerge from these results. First, structural characteristics, primarily family structure and socioeconomic factors, are more important predictors of homicide rates among all racial groups although the particular characteristics of importance vary across groups. Second, characteristics of the metropolitan context, including those that may have a cultural interpretation, are not important predictors of homicide for whites and Latinos once other factors are controlled, but appear more important for blacks. Finally...the standard set of indicators included in models of homicide variation is more effective in explaining white homicide than in predicting rates of black or Latino homicide...

In other words, the usual explanations for high crime rates--poverty, low education, etc.--are not effective predictors for black homicide. There is another factor in play.

The study goes on to point out that:

1. College education has "an impact on black homicide rates approximately three and two times greater" as it does on whites and Latinos respectively.

2. "...black male unemployment levels have a large and significant positive effect on black homicide rates in contrast to the other two groups."

In other words, an unemployed or uneducated black male has a higher likelihood of committing homicide than an unemployed or uneducated white or Latino. The exact same levels of unemployment or educational disadvantage will have a stronger effect on black males than on whites or Latinos.

The author of the study suggests that the illegal drug trade might be a factor: unemployed, uneducated black males often turn to the violent (and deadly) drug trade to make money. This is not proven, it's just a suggestion on the researcher's part.

3. "...the prevalence of guns and level of racial segregation are not important predictors of homicide rates for any of the three racial groups."

So gun control is not a factor. However, the researcher goes on to say:

"However, for the black population only, I do find support for the "Southern cultural of violence" hypothesis once structural characteristics are controlled."

To explain this "southern culture of violence, the author explains:

"Metropolitan areas in the Northeast, a region that is typically more stable and affluent, tend to have large white populations, whereas those in the South, which may be characterized by a subculture of violence, typically have smaller white populations."

4. "Population size has a large and significant positive effect on homicide rates for blacks as well as for Latinos, but not for whites."

So whites in dense population areas are less violent than minorities in the same context.

5. Finally, for blacks, but not for the other two groups, the proportion of the population living in the central city of an MSA/PMSA (metropolitan standard area) is important to predicting homicide rates.

I lived in Detroit, in a city in which I was one of the minority population, for 12 years. I was never the victim of a crime in that time. People tend to get victimized by people of the same race. The high raw numbers of black on black crime are alarming, though.

I had a black friend who got mugged, too, by a black guy. I think with that kind of crime, black women tend to think they are safer in a city with a majority black population than they actually are, and I was always cautious and aware of my surroundings.